It’s been 4 years since Microsoft unveiled their first Xbox Elite controller, however now there’s a brand new Series 2 mannequin coming that provides much more customisation choices and higher battery life. You’ll nonetheless must fork out a mildly ludicrous £160 / $180 for it, however pre-orders are open now if you wish to be one of many first to get one when it launches on November four for PC and Xbox later this yr.
Much like the unique Elite controller, the primary enchantment of the Series 2 controller is having the ability to tweak and customise your thumb sticks and set off buttons precisely to your liking, supposedly supplying you with extra management over the best way you play your favorite games. Personally, I’ve at all times discovered the usual Xbox 360 and Xbox One controllers to be completely sufficient after I’m not utilizing a mouse and keyboard, however twitchy, aggressive varieties with a lot sooner reflexes than I could say in any other case.
And when you do occur to fall into that twitchy, aggressive class, the brand new Series 2 controller seems to be to be a reasonably respectable improve over its predecessor. As properly as a brand new wrap-around rubberised grip, the largest new addition the Series 2 Elite controller brings to the desk is its “adjustable tension thumb sticks”. This helps you to select between three completely different resistance settings, two of which provide the identical quantity of thumbstick resistance as Microsoft’s customary Xbox 360 and Xbox One controllers. Microsoft didn’t elaborate on what the third choice was going to be, sadly, however when you’re significantly wedded to the texture of 1 kind of Xbox controller over one other, then the Series 2 mannequin’s obtained you lined. Here’s a brief trailer to see it in motion:
Another large addition is its built-in rechargeable battery, which Microsoft claims will provide you with as much as 40 hours of battery life per change. It additionally comes with its personal removable charging dock and USB-C cable in its fancy pants carry case, together with a bevy of latest interchangeable thumbsticks, d-pads and paddle shapes. It additionally helps Bluetooth for the primary time, too.
The Series 2 Elite controller additionally comes with an additional, shorter hair set off lock setting, so that you don’t must press them down as far when firing in fast-paced FPS games, and it’ll additionally recognise any changes you make to stated hair set off locks mechanically so that you don’t must hold making modifications within the Xbox Accessories app each time you tweak them. Plus, it could possibly now bear in mind as much as three customized profiles for the entire controller along with its default profile, and also you’ll be capable of change between them at will utilizing the brand new devoted Profile button.
The Xbox Elite Series 2 controller will initially arrive in 24 nations come November 9, together with Austria, Belgium, China, Czech Republic, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hong Kong, Hungary, Ireland, Italy, Japan, Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Slovakia, Spain, Sweden and Switzerland along with the UK and US. Other nations will probably be introduced at a later date.
See our E3 2019 tag for extra protection from the present. Our Brendy and Matt are on the market in Los Angeles, enjoying games and taking names. They’ve additionally been liveblogging the big announcement events with fiercely opposing stances.
